Rebirth of Siheyuan starts in the 1980s

Early the next morning, Cao Zhiqiang went to Lou Xiao'e's room on time with a detailed plan to meet her.

After meeting Lou Xiao'e, Cao Zhiqiang explained in detail why he wanted to open a chef training class.

Lou Xiao'e, as for Lou Xiao'e, was already interested in the project of joining the first chain hotpot restaurant in China.

I also heard that Cao Zhiqiang wanted to use this project and her status as a Hong Kong businessman to persuade the relevant leaders to give Cao Zhiqiang special approval to open the first private company in China, so I was even more interested.

Because in Lou Xiao'e's view, this incident can also verify Cao Zhiqiang's domestic energy and see if he is qualified to cooperate with her.

You know, although strictly speaking, Cao Zhiqiang has some relationship with Lou Xiao'e. After all, they are the sons of an old friend, but this relationship is actually very weak.

If it's just a meeting to chat or even have a meal, that's fine, but if it involves investment cooperation, you need to be cautious.

After all, Cao Zhiqiang is not He Yuzhu, and he does not have that kind of close relationship with Lou Xiao'e.

When Lou Xiao'e and Cao Zhiqiang cooperate, it is impossible to make contributions without benefits. They must pay attention to investment risks and investment return rates.

Although the chef training course Cao Zhiqiang mentioned, or the hot pot franchise project he mentioned sounds good, there are still risks. The biggest problem is who to cooperate with.

As a person from the mainland, Lou Xiaoe is very familiar with various domestic policies and forms.

So she knows very well that if she wants to establish a joint venture in China, she can only seek cooperation with state-owned enterprises.

But at this time, the problems of state-owned enterprises are very complicated, with some good and some bad. Once the investment is wrong, it is likely to lose everything.

Coupled with the injuries Lou Xiao'e had suffered, she was very resistant to cooperating with mainland state-owned enterprises.

Therefore, Lou Xiao'e's idea is to come here to set up a sole proprietorship and not cooperate with others.

In fact, Lou Xiao'e's visit to the capital this time was secondary to inspecting investment projects. The most important thing was to inspect the business environment here and see if it was appropriate to invest and do business here at this time.

In other words, Lou Xiaoe had no idea what she was going to do, she just came to inspect the project and the business environment.

As for the 0.1 share, I just stopped by to see how Silly Zhu was doing.

Unfortunately, after arriving, I was a little scared and didn't dare to see Si Zhu.

"So that's it." Cao Zhiqiang nodded, "Aunt Lou, please excuse me, how was your family's life there after they went to Xiangjiang? How is your family?"

Lou Xiao'e was stunned for a moment, and then her eyes became a little wandering, as if she was lost in memories.

Seeing this situation, Cao Zhiqiang quickly said: "If you don't want to say it, forget it."

"Hey, there's nothing I can't say." Lou Xiao'e shook her head and started talking about that year.

It turned out that after their family fled to Xiangjiang, they settled down quickly with the help of Lou's father's secret savings and the help of friends.

But at first, they had no friends there and had to start from scratch.

Perhaps because of the difficult situation, the Lou family is quite united.

Since the Lou family did not go there alone, but with money, they had a good start in Xiangjiang. They bought an apartment and a hotel at the beginning, and then the family relied on running the hotel.

live.

During that period, because Lou Xiao'e was pregnant, the hotel was mainly run jointly by Lou Xiao'e's brother and sister. Lou Xiao'e did not participate and stayed at home to wait for the birth.

Because she was too bored at home, she chose to study at home.

After giving birth to her child, she went to college again and got a college diploma.

Later, Lou Xiao'e, who graduated from college, married a local businessman, but the two parties had no relationship and no children, so they ended up getting divorced.

Because the businessman Lou Xiaoe married in Hong Kong was very wealthy, after the divorce, probably to avoid trouble, the Hong Kong businessman left Lou Xiaoe a mansion and a large sum of money.

As a result, Lou Xiao'e became the richest person in the Lou family, far surpassing her brothers and sisters.

Lou Xiao'e didn't want to sit back and have nothing to do. It happened that the country was also opening up, so she wanted to come to the mainland to invest and do business.

Because in Lou Xiao'e's view, the mainland has just begun to reform and open up, and there is a blue ocean everywhere. If you invest and do business in the mainland at this time, you will definitely make a lot of money.

On the other hand, Xiangjiang has a small area and fierce competition. If she invests her little money in Xiangjiang, her business may not improve.

It is precisely because of this that Lou Xiaoe came to the mainland to inspect the business environment and projects.

It's just that Lou Xiao'e is cautious and won't invest easily before finding a good project.

Lou Xiao'e mainly visited Shenzhen before, and originally wanted to do import and export business.

But Lou Xiao'e is from the mainland after all.

She knows better than anyone else that when doing business in the mainland, it is best to have a place in the capital first. In this way, she can pull off the tiger's skin and promote the banner, but with less trouble.

That's why she came to the capital to investigate.

In addition, unlike Cao Zhiqiang's imagination, Lou Xiao'e's family has a very good relationship. There is no separation when disaster strikes, and there is no drama about dividing the family property.

Thinking about it, when the family went to Xiangjiang back then, they were not well-off and were unfamiliar with the place. If they separated again, wouldn't they be courting death?

In addition, Lou's father and Lou's mother are still alive, and with these two backbones, the children below would not dare to disunite unless they are crazy.

Also, Lou Xiao'e's parents are actually still alive today, but Lou Xiao'e's father is not in good health now, while Lou Xiao'e's mother is in good health.

It was not what Cao Zhiqiang imagined, that Lou's father died early and his family was scattered.

On the contrary, the Lou family has now taken root in Xiangjiang.

Not only Lou's father and Lou's mother are still alive, but Lou Xiao'e's brothers and sisters have also married locals and started families and businesses in Xiangjiang. They are all living a good life now.

"I see." Cao Zhiqiang nodded, "Then your family is really good and united."

Lou Xiao'e smiled slightly: "We, the Lou family, may be because my father and mother are more open-minded, so we have a good relationship with each other.

Especially after arriving in Xiangjiang, the environment forced us to unite, because without unity, we would not be able to survive.

Although Xiangjiang sounds good, in actual life, it is difficult to describe.

Speaking of which, if it hadn't been for the help of my brothers and sisters, I wouldn't have been able to stay at home and study at home, and I wouldn't have had the chance to get into college."

"A friend in need is a friend indeed, and we hug together to keep warm. It's not bad." Cao Zhiqiang smiled and nodded, "Your family's family tradition is really good."

Lou Xiao'e smiled: "Stop talking about that, can you go and see the place you mentioned? I'm talking about the place where you want to open a restaurant."

"No problem!" Cao Zhiqiang said quickly, "You can go now!"

Lou Xiao'e nodded: "It's not too late, let's go now."

Next, Lou Xiaoe asked for a taxi from the hotel, and then took Cao Zhiqiang with her to the house that Cao Zhiqiang bought in Jinyu Hutong and was still under renovation.

After arriving at the location, Lou Xiao'e was full of praise, saying that this place is really good and a good place to open a restaurant.

The reason is very simple. Lou Xiao'e was born and raised in Beijing, so she is quite familiar with Jinyu Hutong and Wangfujing Street.

I remember that when Lou Xiao'e was still a eldest lady here, she often went shopping in Wangfujing and was very familiar with Jinyu Hutong.

"I remember this place!" Lou Xiao'e looked at the courtyard road along the street that was still being renovated and was about to be renovated. "Back then, this was a silk and satin shop. I even bought clothes here. Unexpectedly, later on

It became like this.”

Cao Zhiqiang smiled: "The silk shop you mentioned was closed long ago, and this Goldfish Alley also went into depression back then.

Later, after it was re-opened, the people in that family were dying and leaving, and the previous opportunity to do the silk and satin business was gone.

The remaining landlord didn't know how to deal with silk fabrics anymore, so he converted the place into a restaurant.

But the remaining homeowner doesn't know how to run a restaurant.

The food he cooked tasted average, so the business was so-so.

That is to say, the location is good and the flow of people is high, so we can get some business.

And that person is not in the mood to continue opening a restaurant here. He always wants to sell the property and then take the money to do business in the south.

So I took a chance and bought this house.

I planned to buy this house and renovate it a little, turning it into the kind of restaurant I mentioned, with chef training."

"I see." Lou Xiao'e nodded, "Since you have bought the house and the decoration is almost done, why do you still want me to invest money?"

Cao Zhiqiang smiled and gestured around with his hands: "Have you seen this street? I mean Goldfish Alley!"

Lou Xiao'e looked at it, and then nodded thoughtfully: "I saw it, it's a little more dilapidated than before, what next?"

Cao Zhiqiang smiled slightly: "Then? Of course, buy this street!"

"What?" Lou Xiao'e was stunned, "You want to buy this street?"

"It's us, not me." Cao Zhiqiang said with a smile, "I am alone and I don't have the strength yet."

After laughing, Cao Zhiqiang added: "If you and I can succeed in our joint venture, we can take advantage of the current downturn in housing prices and buy this street.

Even if you can't buy all the shops along the entire street, you can start with my house and buy the surrounding houses. You can buy as much as you can, the more the better.

At that time, we will buy the house first, and then go to the city government for a food and culture street project, saying that we will renovate the house here and build a restaurant street with courtyard culture. Isn’t this a promising idea?”

"The specialty food street of Siheyuan Culture?" Lou Xiao'e opened her mouth wide, "Your project is a bit big, how much will it cost?"

"It doesn't cost much." Cao Zhiqiang said with a smile, "This alley is quite special, the street width is relatively large, it can be said to be a whole street.

This Jinyu Alley is not long, less than 600 meters in total, but its location is quite good.

We don’t want to take over all of Jinyu Hutong, we don’t have the strength yet.

I only plan to take stock of the area starting from Wangfujing Street in the west and ending at Xiaowei Hutong in the east.

The total length of this street is only more than 200 meters, and there are no large houses on both sides. They are all old and messy houses. Most of the residents are poor and can be easily purchased.

From now on, we will sell as many houses as we can along the street from Wangfujing Street in the west to Xiaowei Hutong in the east.

Believe me, this place will definitely be demolished and renovated in the future. Even if you leave it here, you will make a lot of money sooner or later.

What's more, if we have sufficient funds, we can apply to the local government and let us demolish and renovate it.

If a high-end foreign-related hotel is built here, think about it, with the current tourism boom in the capital and the location close to Wangfujing, wouldn’t it make a lot of money?

Even if we don’t have the strength to build hotels for the time being, we will build a few more stores and turn all the hotels into unique chain hotels.

For example, restaurants from the four major cuisines of Sichuan, Shandong, Huai, and Guangdong are all here, and they are all operated in a unified manner. This can also create a smaller dining circle and create a clustering effect.

At that time, let’s say hello to the relevant foreign tourism departments. If foreigners come here to travel to Beijing, then this place will become an Internet celebrity place. Isn’t making money as easy as drinking water?”

"It's interesting." Lou Xiao'e nodded, "But it's not easy, right?"

"I will be responsible for establishing connections. It is easy to convince people around me to sell their houses." Cao Zhiqiang said with a smile, "We are short of money now."

Lou Xiao'e thought thoughtfully: "Then if I want to invest, how much will it cost?"

Cao Zhiqiang said with a smile: "To be honest, I have a lot of money on hand now and can buy many houses around me. But if you want to do a large-scale project and buy all the shops along this half street, you at least have to buy it."

Invest this amount.”

After speaking, Cao Zhiqiang stretched out five fingers.

"Five hundred thousand?" Lou Xiao'e asked.

"I'm just kidding," Cao Zhiqiang said, "I took out half a million myself, I said five million!

By the way, it’s five million RMB, not Hong Kong dollars!

Don’t forget, we not only have to buy a house, but we also have to spend money on decoration and renovation, which is quite expensive.”

"This..." Lou Xiao'e frowned, "This amount is a bit large."

"Then how much can you take?" Cao Zhiqiang asked.

Lou Xiao'e thought for a while: "At most two million... Hong Kong dollars."

Cao Zhiqiang frowned: "Isn't that just over 800,000 RMB? It's too little."

After shaking his head, Cao Zhiqiang said: "How about this, you take one million RMB, I will provide some more money, and I will also be responsible for building relationships and providing technical support. Let's jointly build this food street business of converting houses into restaurants. How about that?"

Listen to me, Aunt Lou, and do it now!

Today, foreign capital has not yet come in on a large scale, private companies have not yet begun operations, especially while housing prices are low, and most of these are private residences. If we buy this place as early as possible, we will make a fortune earlier!

This is not so much a hotel business as a real estate business. Don’t miss this opportunity!

If we wait a few years and wait for foreign businessmen to react and wealthy giants come to invest in real estate, and the government’s housing buying and selling policy also changes, then we won’t have anything to worry about!”

Lou Xiao'e thought for a moment and said, "Okay, I can offer one million, but how do you calculate the shares?"

Cao Zhiqiang laughed: "Aunt Lou, don't worry about the stock issue now, that will happen later.

For now, let's sign a letter of intent for cooperation first, and then I'll take this thing and go to the State Administration for Industry and Commerce for negotiation.

With your letter of intent as a Hong Kong businessman, it will be easier for me to negotiate for a private enterprise license.

After my private catering company license is approved and my private company is established, how about we talk about shares and cooperation?"

Lou Xiao'e thought for a while: "Okay, that's it. But, can you really buy all the houses here? What if someone is not willing to move out?"

Cao Zhiqiang shook his head: "Aunt Lou, although you grew up here, you left too early after all, and you are already a little unfamiliar with the situation here.

Nowadays, we can already buy and sell real estate, but because it has just been opened up and only allows private buying and selling of real estate, there is no real real estate trading market, so the real estate buying and selling market is still quite chaotic.

In other words, many people are eager to sell the properties here, especially the old-style courtyard houses here, and then move to new buildings to live in.

In Jinyu Alley, except for a few places like the Garden and the Peace Hotel, the rest of the places are mostly honest courtyards and courtyards.

In a house like this, the people inside wish they could sell the house early and then use the money to live in a building somewhere else.

In other words, if we are willing to take over the house now, there will definitely be a lot of people crying and shouting to sell the house, and the price will be absolutely cost-effective.

Even if there are a few nail dealers left who don't want to sell, just avoid them. Anyway, the number won't be large and it won't make a difference.

In other words, what I call a food street project means that the houses here can be taken over, but not demolished.

We don’t collect those big houses with good yards, but only those old and shabby ones. We win by quantity. The purpose is to occupy the land and build a large scale.

I don’t insist that all the houses on the street belong to us, I just need that most of them belong to us.

And in this case, the money spent is not much, at least not much for now.

After the house is taken over, cleaned up a little, and renovated a little, it can be turned into a characteristic cultural and food street.

In this way, there is no need to spend too much decoration costs.

When you make more money, you can then consider getting a loan from a bank and start a second-phase project, such as knocking down a dilapidated house and rebuilding it, building a building, building a hotel, or anything else.

At that time, we can use the excuse of starting a new project to apply to the relevant local departments for demolition and reconstruction.

As long as the project is approved, we do not need to be responsible for the early demolition issues, and the relevant departments will do it for us.

This is not Xiangjiang. The current housing demolition is not that complicated. As long as the relevant departments are dealt with, demolition and reconstruction can be done in just one sentence.

So, this is a real estate business under the guise of opening a food street, do you understand?

If I hadn't been anxious and wanted to take advantage of the low price early, and if I trusted you more, I would have done it myself and wouldn't have asked you to cooperate."

Lou Xiao'e thought for a moment, then nodded: "Sure, in that case, I'll wait for your good news.

As long as you can obtain a business license for a private enterprise in China, then I will invest in the project you mentioned!"